The Old Gear
by Anzac123
Summary: Twenty-seven years after Emergence Day an old gear laments about his role in the Pendulum Wars and how it contributed towards humanity's near defeat in the Locust/Lambent War.


City One

27 A.E.

I step off the monorail into the bustling central plaza of City One. Surrounding me is a scene I never thought I'd see just two decades prior. Vendors lined the street pedaling their wares to passing families. Couples sat on benches sharing snacks and laughing. A little girl with a blue tulip in her hair stares into a shop window where a litter of kittens play pleading for her parents to get her one. It had taken time, but slowly life on Sera was returning to what it once was.

Two streets down was Memorial Park where I was to meet my contact. I found him sitting on a bench looking up at the Pendulum War Veterans' Memorial. Standing at three meters the bronze statue was of a Gear in full armor gripping a bundle of dog tags in one hand and a Lancer MK1 in the other. As my contact stood to greet me I couldn't help but notice how pitifully small and frail he looked compared to the statue. He was skinny as a stick and used a cane to hobble around. A scar ran across his forehead almost becoming lost in his wrinkles. His emerald green eyes that sat behind spectacles were the only thing about him that didn't look ancient and even those were beginning to dull. It was somewhat hard to believe that he was one of, if not the oldest, Pendulum War veteran left on Sera. Michael Landic shook my hand and we exchanged pleasantries. Surprisingly his grip was still firm and powerful. Joining him at the bench he pointed his cane towards a massive dome shaped building that sat on the other end of the park. He informed me that was the Locust/Lambent War Memorial. If you went inside you could look up the names of all COG Gears that had fallen during that conflict. No such thing existed for the Pendulum War Memorial; only a plaque that read: **DEAD-322,582,496; WOUNDED-1,890,374,984; MISSING-12,837,843.** The names of those who became casualties would be lost to history, nothing more than vague statistics. To Michael Landic some of those numbers had been his friends.

"The war with the Locusts was terrible." he began. "I've read that somewhere in the realm of 99% of all humans on Sera were killed in about a decade and a half. That's almost six or seven billion people dead. Crazy number when you think about it but its not unimaginable to an old geezer like me. I've seen what modern weapons can do to a group of people. One second they're there and the next all that's left is ribbons of meat. It's our fault it got as bad as it did though. When I say our I'm referring to my generation and the two or three before me. I didn't see it then but I've had sixty-one years to think about this. Maybe if we wouldn't have been blinded by greed and saw who the real enemy was we could have put aside our differences and prepared for E-Day. Pushed them back into the Hallow and wiped both them and the Lambent out before everything went to hell."

His grip tightened on his cane as he looked up at the bronzed Gear.

"The entire planet was on it's last legs near the end of the Pendulum War. If it wasn't for the hammer of dawn than all the Locusts would have had to do was wait until we perfected Lightmass Missiles and we would have killed ourselves off in the blink of an eye. Thinking about all the good men and women on both sides who were killed or maimed that could have been used against the Locust makes me mad. By following our greed blindly we essentially handed the surface to the Locust on a silver platter. Maybe we deserved what happened to us." He adjusted his glasses and straightened his posture. "I'm sure you didn't come all this way from City Three just to hear an old man talk politics. You want to know what I did in the war. I enlisted at the earliest age I could which, at the time, was sixteen and a half in 46 B.E. Went through basic training and got orders to the 4th Ephyra Light Infantry Division. I arrived just mere days before we launched Operation Sword Point; the invasion of the Ostri Republic. Frost was setting in and it was cold. So….goddamn…cold.

 _47 B.E._

 _Ostrini Border_

I rubbed my gloved hands together in a feeble attempt to generate warmth. My body suit and armor was supposed to keep in body heat but that at the moment it felt like it wasn't helping at all. Shells the size of boxcars screamed overhead. If you watched closely enough you could see their outlines against the gray sky. Tense, I looked at the veterans to gauge their reactions. If they ducked so would I. One looked up from sharpening the bayonet of his Lancer and after listening for a moment just shrugged. Off in the distance the shells exploded sending weak vibrations through my boots. It was all I needed to see to relax.

I leaned against the trench wall with my Lancer between my knees and looked up. Heavy snow fluttered down onto my helmet's visor. Lately there had been so much snowfall that working parties were organized to shovel snow from the trenches. You had to be careful doing that because a few men had been sniped when they rose their heads too far above the lip of the trench. One of these days it would be my turn to shovel snow considering I was one of the new guys. When my turn came I'd make sure to pretty much be on my belly while shoveling snow.

A Gear without her helmet emerged from the dugout carved into the frozen earth of the trench wall. Her beady black eyes locked right on me. "Rookie! Atten-tion! Port…Arms!"

I snapped too attention and brought my rifle to my chest. Sergeant Valarie Montebon strode in front of me. The rest of the squad stopped whatever they were doing and watched the spectacle.

"Inspection…Arms!" Sergeant Montebon barked. Despite barely being able to feel my fingers I pulled back and locked the charging handle ejecting the round that was in the chamber. Next I twisted the rifle so the ejection port cover was level with my eyes to verify the chamber was clear and returned to port arms. Sergeant Montebon had caught the ejected round and was inspecting it. Satisfied she tossed it back at me and snatched my rifle away in one smooth motion. The round slipped through my numb fingers but I knew better than pick it up and instead went to attention. "What's the Golden Rule, Rookie?"

"Take cover or die, Sergeant." I replied.

"How many times a day should you clean your rifle?"

"Every opportunity you get, Sergeant."

"What kind of grenade is the best to clear a trench, Rookie?"

When I froze it wasn't because of the cold weather. I was honestly scared of what the woman would do to me if I got the answer wrong. Finally I said, "I don't know, Sergeant."

"Corporal Beatie!" Sergeant Montebon roared. One of the helmeted Gears popped up and stood at parade rest. "What kind of grenade is the best to clear a trench?"

"A frag grenade, Sergeant."

"Correct. Now why doesn't Private Landic know that?"

"I haven't taught him that yet, Sergeant."

Sergeant Montebon shoved my rifle back into my hands and stormed over to Corporal Thomas Beatie. "I highly suggest you unfuck the Gears I put under you before I volunteer you for Scorcher duty. I'll make sure to paint the tanks bright fucking pink so every Indie within one hundred kilometers can see you." Her voice never rose beyond a harsh whisper but we all heard her.

"Good to go, Sergeant." Corporal Beatie replied. With that Sergeant Montebon returned to her dugout. Corporal Beatie's shoulders slumped and he called me over. "Welp, Rookie guess there's a thing or two I missed."

"I'm sorry, Corporal." I said taking a seat closer to the rest of the squad. "Didn't mean you to get you in trouble."

Corporal Beatie laughed and patted me on the shoulder. "Don't worry about it, kid. Sergeant M just wants you to be ready for when we go over the top. It could happen any day now. Anyway this is kinda important." I took out a small waterproof notebook and prepared to take notes. Corporal Beatie laid out two grenades on a crate. He pointed to the first one. "This is the Bolo Fragmentation Grenade. Has about a five second fuse but that's never consistent. We use this to clear out trenches because as soon as it goes of you can round the corner and clean up whatever isn't splattered against the wall. Can't really do that with this." He pointed to the Incendiary Grenade. It looked handmade in comparison to the Bolo and when I pointed this out Corporal Beatie nodded. "We make them here in the trenches. Pour some Imulsion in a glass bottle and stick a standard Bolo fuse on it and boom," he mimed an explosion with his hands. "You got you what we call an Indie Cooker. These are best for clearing out dug outs. There aren't many situations where I can see you wanting to clear those out by hand so instead we just throw a couple of these in there to burn or suffocate any stubborn Indies. Not so good at clearing trenches. Well actually it is but now we'd have to find a way to get around the burning trench which gives the enemy more time to rally and counter attack. You tracking?"

"Like a tank, Corporal." I replied as I finished up sketching out the two grenades and adding small notes.

"Dunno why we even bother teaching him all this." the Gear that was still sharpening his bayonet quipped. "Poor sod is just gonna buy the farm as soon as we get moving."

"We said the same thing about you, Lucky Dog." Private First Class Danielle Popper said as she removed her helmet and scratched at her scalp. Lice was a common pest in the trenches and every had it. "If you weren't so damn lucky you would have been dead ages ago."

PFC Andrew 'Lucky Dog' Doyle merely shook his helmeted head. "I was never no rookie. Seen enough fighting and shooting back home to last me a lifetime. I know how to stay alive."

"Bullshit." Private Timothy Jones said as he laughed. "I grew up across town from you. Your part of town wasn't that bad."

PFC Doyle pointed his bayonet at him and snarled behind his visor. "You ever say that again pretty boy I'll cut you so bad all your parents' money couldn't even put you back together."

"Calm down you two." Corporal Phillis Pope said as he walked up to their little group. "Rumor behind the lines is we'll be kicking off soon. Like as soon as tonight. So Lucky Dog," Corporal Pope jerked his head towards PFC Doyle. "put that butter knife away before I make you eat it."

"Wilco, Corporal." PFC Doyle grumbled.

"Bee-Boy if you'd join me to let the good ole sergeant in on the latest scoop?" Corporal Pope said gesturing grandiosely towards the dinky hole in the trench wall.

"Age before beauty, Poop." Corporal Beatie replied standing up and grabbing his Gnasher. "Two of you clean your weapons. The other two get up on the firing step."

Myself and Private Jones sat with our leg crossed cleaning our rifles. We didn't say much anything but every once in a while we'd catch each others glance. In contrast the other two were resting their rifles on the parapet chatting away. They'd been through this before. They knew how to handle the prebattle chitters. It made me a little jealous how easily they did it.

"You scared?" I jumped a little when Private Jones asked me that. Some crazy part of me figured that he'd frozen and become a statue in the cold.

"Yeah." I muttered making sure the two up on the firing step couldn't hear me.

"Me too." was all he said.


End file.
